Incoherent Babble

Well, OK, maybe Linux isn’t US, but it’s certainly ME now. I’ve officially become a Linux desktop user.

My distro of choice? Slackware 10, of course! Unfortunately, it supports the onboard equipment in Dell computers very poorly, and Fedora Core 3 (currently Test 3) is a perfect contender.

So why did I switch? Read on for my reasons, as well as some of the hurdles I hit along the way…

Well, I know you’ve all heard this line before, but it’s the truth, as much as I hate (not really) to admit it… I was sick of the crashes. Well, they weren’t really crashes. Windows XP is much better about not crashing, it simply stops working until you finally reboot it all on your own.

My brand new Dell Dimension, sporting a respectable 3ghz processor, was less than 3 months old, and XP Pro had already come to a grinding halt. Gone were the 7 week long uptimes I’d gradually (amazingly) grown used to. Here to stay were 3 day uptimes, apparently. I tried everything I could. I knew my system wasn’t infested with spyware, but I ran AdAware to be sure. Of course, it picked up cookies from all the ads everyone plasters on their sites, but that was it. I also knew it wasn’t virus-laiden, but a quick scan of the hard drive proved my point yet again.

The next step was to take a look at all the stuff I’d managed to accumulate over 3 whole months. Well, there were all the standards. Of course I had my mIRC first… not exactly a hog. Then there was Office 2003. Yeah, it’s beefy, but it’s nothing out of the ordinary. On and on I went. Nothing, nothing, nothing. Finally, I just had enough. A quick backup of my essentials and I was gone…

I already had the Slackware discs on hand, and had run it not only as a server at work, but also as a “play” desktop on an old 1.1 Celeron that sits behind me. I loved how it seemed to come with anything (just like Redhat/Fedora), but didn’t try to screw with anything like they did. The install procedure wasn’t nearly as friendly as Redhat’s, but it was by no means difficult.

The install process on my junk box had gone flawlessly. Unfortunately, my new Dell had much more modern hardware and was in for a rougher time. While the install did indeed go flawlessly, and Slackware did a respectable job of detecting my hardware (including the onboard Intel network card), I soon discovered upon issuing “startx” at my new command prompt that it hadn’t detected my video settings at all. I was greatly disappointed. I’d never needed to install a new video driver in Linux before, and had no real clue of where to go from there.

I started out by looking for some Dell drivers. As with many other manufacturers, they only cater to the Windows world. OK, my next approach, which is where I generally start in the first place, was the almighty Google! Google, as usual, came to my rescue. There were more posts than I could count on more Linux forums that I knew ever existed about my exact problem, as well as a few others I hadn’t gotten to yet.

Eventually, I was to go directly to the Intel website and download the onboard video drivers for my motherboard. It was a tad confusing trying to find the exact driver that I needed. The first set I thought was the correct model number didn’t want to compile on my system because they didn’t find a supported device. Back to the Intel website, I finally managed to track down the right set (wouldn’t it be nice if Dell were to put the exact model number on their website when you look up your system?). They compiled, and I was left with only one more step. One of the forums also pointed towards a patch that fixed a problem in the amount of video memory detected. After every reboot, the patch had to be run before the xserver would start up.

After getting the drivers working, I had to track down the xconfig program in Slackware and re-run it, providing manually all the information (which driver, how much memory, monitor type, resolution, refresh rates, the works). By now, I was beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel, but I was also getting greatly discouraged at the same time.

Another “startx” at the console and I was up and running. I was greeted with the wonderful new look of an untainted Gnome 2.6. The journey wasn’t quite over yet, however. I soon discovered that my sound was also not working. The journey to create some noise wasn’t nearly as difficult, more so to the point of being annoying that Slackware wasn’t able to solve such a simple problem itself. The Alsa driver simply needed to be loaded and then alsamixer needed to be told that it shouldn’t mute the hardware. Bingo, everything was working…

Now, you’re probably wondering how I came to love Fedora… Well, Slackware’s a bit vague on the documentation side of things. I finally got things up and running perfectly. I got all my stuff loaded, including CrossOver office from Codeweavers, so I could run my beloved Microsoft Office (I know, I know, but you have to admit there’s nothing to compare to them…), when I decided that I’d go ahead and upgrade my kernel to 2.6 (from the default 2.4 that ships with Slackware). Well, you’d think it’d be a simple process, but without any guide on how to proceed, somehow, I managed to botch the job, and didn’t notice until returning from vacation approximately 3 weeks later.

So came the Fedora install. I knew from experience that Red Hat had been virtually flawless in its detection of and support for all hardware known to man. So came the new Red Hat incarnation, regardless of name… 4 CD ISO images later and I was greeted by the very familiar GUI of the Red Hat installer system. An hour later, and I was up and running without a hitch. After several more hours of downloading patches from the Red Hat Network (or whatever it’s called now…), I was fully updated. I had the latest Gnome, I had the latest kernel, and I was ecstatically happy. I have been so ever since.

The only remaining step was to finally take the plunge and install Linux on my laptop as well. After a few weeks of loving my new Linux desktop and not having any withdrawls from Windows, I was off… Fedora Core 3 (Test 3) had some issues with my Dell Inspiron 5150’s fan and overheated several times, giving me probably the biggest scare of my life (now that my notebook is just 3 months out of its year warranty). A fall back (and a corresponding 4 CD ISO images) later, and I was up and running with the stable version of Fedora, Core 2. As with the desktop system, I haven’t looked back yet. In fact, I’ve looked forward to the official release of Fedora Core 3 (slated for November 6th-8th) much more than I ever anticipated the release of a Microsoft product.

So those are my rather lengthy (and probably very boring) adventures in the transition to Linux. I may provide a more technical account of my Laptop’s rockier transition later (such as the difficulties with Wireless LANs on Linux), but for now, that’s it.

I encourage you to give Fedora (and Slackware!) a try, even if it’s just as a box you’re comfortable with blowing away any time you screw up. The more people who use Linux and then convert to it, the better. We may never totally rid ourselves of the Windows world (remember that 1.1 Celeron? It now runs Windows 2000 Professional, just for the odd application that MUST have Windows - like my LabSimulations for school), but we sure can try our hardest and force it as far out of our lives as possible. As for me? I’m a Linux junkie now, and I’m learning more than I ever have about an Operating System before. And don’t feel like it’s a one way path. I still use Windows at work, and I’m still the head computer support specialist there. Everything (including several non-Linux servers) are running Windows, and I’m not freaking out…